Ian Buruma exposes our inherited misconceptions of Asia; Jed Perl confronts Marcel Duchamps’ incomprehensible reputation; David Nirenberg probes the history of the way we look at history; Yegor Lapshov reports on his misadventures at the Venice Biennale; Kenda Mutongi introduces an African environmental artist; Husam Maarouf recalls the experience of writing in a warzone; Luciano Floridi laments the authority of phony cultural objects; Justin Smith-Ruiu considers the new legitimacy of medically assisted suicide; Daniel Agbiboa uncovers a hidden complexity in forgiveness; James McAuley pens a portrait of a little-known Jewish heroine; Ben Libman analyzes the power of the gaze, male and otherwise; Theo Lipsky reveals the unfamiliar liberal foundations of the American military; Christina Cacouris indicts fashion designers who loathe women; Joseph Celizic testifies to moving on from a family tragedy; Jasmine Ramze Rezaee questions who Canadian democracy is for; Celeste Marcus deplores American Jewry’s imagined Israel; Leon Wieseltier defends the authority of elders; and new poetry from Ange Mlinko and Michael Hofmann
Arash Azizi joins Morten Høi Jensen about his recent Liberties essay "Irandoost, or Confessions of a Patriot."
David A. Bell joins Morten Høi Jensen to discuss his essay from Liberties' spring issue "The Life and Death of the Book Review."
October 6, 2026
On October 7, 2023, Shlomo Efrati was called up for reserve duty. He was stationed at the Civilian Casualty Collection Station, for treating bodies of civilian casualties. 10.8.2023 “When my children learn and celebrate the Holy One Blessed Be He says to the angels look at my beloved people in their pain and trouble how...
Read More Read MoreSeptember 28, 2026
James Gray is the least heralded major American filmmaker now working. From Little Odessa, released in 1994 when he was 25, to his new film Paper Tiger, his ninth, Gray has carved out a serious body of work in American movies at a time when most American movies have no time for anything serious. As...
Read More Read MoreSeptember 28, 2026
Most of the Jewish community in Israel does not think there needs to be a critical examination of the Israeli war in Gaza. For the opposing camp, championed by the radical left, the assertion that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza is a necessary prerequisite for entering into any conversation at all. Marooned between blocs...
Read More Read MoreSeptember 21, 2026
Midway through Plato’s Symposium the comic poet Aristophanes takes the floor. He tells us that, in the beginning, we were whole, shaped like the heavenly bodies. But we became too powerful and made war on the gods, after which they punished us by tearing us in two. We now resembled the Greek gods (which is...
Read More Read MoreSeptember 14, 2026
The war in Sudan entered its fourth year on April 15, 2026, one chapter in a long series that has spanned decades. This particular war is a violent power struggle between two military factions: the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). They are fighting for control over state resources and...
Read More Read MoreSeptember 7, 2026
2024 The hill I want to die on is Golgotha and the season is spring in the Gulf and the vista from the cross is a stretch of I-10 between College Station, Texas, and New Orleans, Louisiana, on the grim drive home after my brother Bryan died in 2024. Every 9/11 survivor will tell you...
Read More Read MoreAugust 31, 2026
Dan Robbins was a competent painter. He was not a great painter. He knew that about himself. Robbins made a living in the art departments of car manufacturers until, in 1949, he was hired by the Palmer Show Card Paint Company and tasked with selling more paint. Robbins was no student of art history, but...
Read More Read MoreAugust 24, 2026
On Figueroa Street in Los Angeles, the prostitutes are as young as 13 years old. They walk the sidewalks in heat and cold waiting for men to stop their cars and beckon to them. The girls have a nightly earnings quota. If they don’t reach it, their traffickers will punish them. The customers want girls...
Read More Read MoreAugust 17, 2026
The impulse to separate the literary critic from the mere consumer, the serious reader from the lightweight, is abiding. Several means of demarcation have been used; one is how much interest, and what kind, a reader shows in the person behind the work. The Guardian recently drew a line against the persistent interest in Elena...
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Arash Azizi joins Morten Høi Jensen about his recent Liberties essay "Irandoost, or Confessions of a Patriot."
David A. Bell joins Morten Høi Jensen to discuss his essay from Liberties' spring issue "The Life and Death of the Book Review."
